| Yongey Peace Prevails Center 7714 W. Catalina Drive Phoenix, AZ 85033 |
| Under the guidance of Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche |
Finding Peace: Love & Compassion
by Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche
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Everything to do with our practice has to be seen from the perspective of balance. The Buddha spoke of
the Middle Way, the view being in the Middle Way, meditation being Middle Way, our actions and
conduct in the world being in the Middle way. That is to say, not falling into one extreme or the other,
but being balanced. Similarly, compassion for others has to be bought into balance with wisdom. If we
have compassion without wisdom, it’s not particularly powerful, and not necessarily going to accomplish
very much at all. But where we have balance between practice and wisdom we have the most effective
approach for benefiting others as well as ourselves. Now, what this means is that we all have to be able to
evaluate our own strengths and weaknesses, and understand what we are capable of and not yet capable
of.
Let me give you an example. There is an account in the previous lifetime of a Buddha who, as a prince,
gave his body to a starving tiger and she ate his body. The Buddha himself in commenting on this story
said no one who has not achieved the first of the 10 levels of a bodhisattva should ever attempt anything
like that, because it would only harm them. They will only experience great fear and suffering, and it
would not serve any purpose. The Buddha pointed out that what might be appropriate action for
someone who is a highly realized being would not necessarily be appropriate for someone who is not that
far along in the path, and might in fact, constitute a great obstacle to them.
However, we should not, of course, let go of that ideal of compassion. Why it is, after all, we are
practicing the spiritual path is to benefit all beings in the first place. That should be our motivation and
we never want to let go of that. This is the perspective of compassion that has the wisdom component.
And with that kind of balanced approach we progress to a greater and greater degree of capability, (such
as the first level of bodhisattva realization), in benefiting more beings than you can now, because you
approach it in his methodical way. So, we should understand that compassion is an integral part of our
practice, but we should also be wise and self-honest about our current limitation. The key is to do as
much as possible at the present time, but work toward more and more capability.
I would like to talk about this second [of the three] major qualities further. It incorporates what we call
love and compassion. They are factors that are inherent in us. There are no human beings, no matter
how fierce, how cruel, how carnivorous, how aggressive, and how vicious, who in some circumstances
don’t have some shred of love and compassion; and the capacity to feel them to some degree, no matter
how rudimentary. It is in human nature to feel love and compassion
And so everyone has a soft spot, somebody he cares about, a spouse, a friend, a child, or a family
member. Just as there is some inkling of that natural peace in all of us, from time to time we get a
glimpse of this love and compassion, which does emerge, to a greater or lesser degree in all of us. In
particular, the fact that we have minds at all, that we are sentient life forms means that on a very
rudimentary level we want to be happy and we want to avoid suffering. This is a sign of that innate
quality of love and compassion. The fact that we have that strong sense of self-preservation, of wanting
to avoid suffering and obtain happiness, is an expression of our capacity that we have of love and
compassion as part of our nature.
Here the term love refers to that desire for happiness for oneself and any one else. In the same way the
desire for oneself or others to be free of suffering is compassion. We already have that to some degree. The
trick is to know how to use that love and compassion profitably so that we win and others win. If we are
in a situation where we are too focused on our own welfare where we are too self-centered, then we have
to arouse and nurture that energy of altruism towards others. The reason for that lies in the fact that we
all want happiness and avoid suffering.
Actually the fundamental issue of wanting happiness and not wanting suffering is very subjective,
because each person has individual wants and needs, and feelings of what their happiness consists of.
Some people really love to live an extremely simple life where they have nothing to wear, barely a roof
over their heads just enough to keep their bodies and soul together and they are happy. Other people don’
t feel they are happy unless they have a big house, and all kinds of things around them. But that doesn’t
mean happiness lies in either of those extreme situations. It’s in the subjective mind of the perceiver. All
of this is a sign that we do have this natural peace, this inherent quality within us; it just expresses itself
in different ways according to our different inclinations.
My friend, the rock climber, loves the rush of climbing on a dangerous cliff. But that doesn’t mean that
the experience of climbing the cliff is due to the cliff having some inherent quality of good, bad, happy,
sad, or anything. It’s his subjective experience. If it was the case that the rock’s face by nature was
something painful everybody would avoid it like the plague. If it were the case that it was inherently
exciting and delightful everybody will be climbing the rock’s face. It’s very different for different people,
because of how our subjectivity about this particular issue [of wanting happiness and not wanting
suffering] expresses itself in different circumstances. Otherwise we would all feel the same way about
every issue.
Because of our commonality in wanting happiness and avoiding suffering regardless of individual
interpretation, we can begin to arouse and accentuate our altruism, our love, and compassion towards
others. We start to be sensitive to the fact everyone just like us wants happiness and avoids suffering. We
start to see the connection between others and us. As others feel less threatened, we are less likely to feel
adverse toward them. We become more content and less reactive with people. So, it benefits all, which is
a win-win situation.
the Middle Way, the view being in the Middle Way, meditation being Middle Way, our actions and
conduct in the world being in the Middle way. That is to say, not falling into one extreme or the other,
but being balanced. Similarly, compassion for others has to be bought into balance with wisdom. If we
have compassion without wisdom, it’s not particularly powerful, and not necessarily going to accomplish
very much at all. But where we have balance between practice and wisdom we have the most effective
approach for benefiting others as well as ourselves. Now, what this means is that we all have to be able to
evaluate our own strengths and weaknesses, and understand what we are capable of and not yet capable
of.
Let me give you an example. There is an account in the previous lifetime of a Buddha who, as a prince,
gave his body to a starving tiger and she ate his body. The Buddha himself in commenting on this story
said no one who has not achieved the first of the 10 levels of a bodhisattva should ever attempt anything
like that, because it would only harm them. They will only experience great fear and suffering, and it
would not serve any purpose. The Buddha pointed out that what might be appropriate action for
someone who is a highly realized being would not necessarily be appropriate for someone who is not that
far along in the path, and might in fact, constitute a great obstacle to them.
However, we should not, of course, let go of that ideal of compassion. Why it is, after all, we are
practicing the spiritual path is to benefit all beings in the first place. That should be our motivation and
we never want to let go of that. This is the perspective of compassion that has the wisdom component.
And with that kind of balanced approach we progress to a greater and greater degree of capability, (such
as the first level of bodhisattva realization), in benefiting more beings than you can now, because you
approach it in his methodical way. So, we should understand that compassion is an integral part of our
practice, but we should also be wise and self-honest about our current limitation. The key is to do as
much as possible at the present time, but work toward more and more capability.
I would like to talk about this second [of the three] major qualities further. It incorporates what we call
love and compassion. They are factors that are inherent in us. There are no human beings, no matter
how fierce, how cruel, how carnivorous, how aggressive, and how vicious, who in some circumstances
don’t have some shred of love and compassion; and the capacity to feel them to some degree, no matter
how rudimentary. It is in human nature to feel love and compassion
And so everyone has a soft spot, somebody he cares about, a spouse, a friend, a child, or a family
member. Just as there is some inkling of that natural peace in all of us, from time to time we get a
glimpse of this love and compassion, which does emerge, to a greater or lesser degree in all of us. In
particular, the fact that we have minds at all, that we are sentient life forms means that on a very
rudimentary level we want to be happy and we want to avoid suffering. This is a sign of that innate
quality of love and compassion. The fact that we have that strong sense of self-preservation, of wanting
to avoid suffering and obtain happiness, is an expression of our capacity that we have of love and
compassion as part of our nature.
Here the term love refers to that desire for happiness for oneself and any one else. In the same way the
desire for oneself or others to be free of suffering is compassion. We already have that to some degree. The
trick is to know how to use that love and compassion profitably so that we win and others win. If we are
in a situation where we are too focused on our own welfare where we are too self-centered, then we have
to arouse and nurture that energy of altruism towards others. The reason for that lies in the fact that we
all want happiness and avoid suffering.
Actually the fundamental issue of wanting happiness and not wanting suffering is very subjective,
because each person has individual wants and needs, and feelings of what their happiness consists of.
Some people really love to live an extremely simple life where they have nothing to wear, barely a roof
over their heads just enough to keep their bodies and soul together and they are happy. Other people don’
t feel they are happy unless they have a big house, and all kinds of things around them. But that doesn’t
mean happiness lies in either of those extreme situations. It’s in the subjective mind of the perceiver. All
of this is a sign that we do have this natural peace, this inherent quality within us; it just expresses itself
in different ways according to our different inclinations.
My friend, the rock climber, loves the rush of climbing on a dangerous cliff. But that doesn’t mean that
the experience of climbing the cliff is due to the cliff having some inherent quality of good, bad, happy,
sad, or anything. It’s his subjective experience. If it was the case that the rock’s face by nature was
something painful everybody would avoid it like the plague. If it were the case that it was inherently
exciting and delightful everybody will be climbing the rock’s face. It’s very different for different people,
because of how our subjectivity about this particular issue [of wanting happiness and not wanting
suffering] expresses itself in different circumstances. Otherwise we would all feel the same way about
every issue.
Because of our commonality in wanting happiness and avoiding suffering regardless of individual
interpretation, we can begin to arouse and accentuate our altruism, our love, and compassion towards
others. We start to be sensitive to the fact everyone just like us wants happiness and avoids suffering. We
start to see the connection between others and us. As others feel less threatened, we are less likely to feel
adverse toward them. We become more content and less reactive with people. So, it benefits all, which is
a win-win situation.
| -- from a teaching in 2006 or earlier |